How to Skip to the Trailers & Commercials on DVDs and Blu-ray Discs

I'm getting more and more annoyed with the crazy number of trailers and commercials on some DVDs and Blu-ray discs that you can't skip, so I really appreciate the Lifehacker story that compiled several tips on how to get right to the movie.

The always-helpful Amit Agarwal from Digital Inspiration rounds up several methods for skipping the trailers, warnings, and other crap on a DVD so you can get straight to the movie you're trying to watch. The first tip, from CNET author Tom Merritt, is the easiest. Just press Stop, Stop, then Play on many DVDs to skip right to the movie. This method won't always work, so if it doesn't, don't give up hope! If twice doesn't work, Salon.com's Richard Rider says pressing Stop three times, followed by Play, will do the trick.

Comments

Or, another method which may be faster is just to go 100x+ fast-forward (or the max fast-forward of your machine) on the disc. This typically breezes through the trailers in about 10 seconds (and circumvents the need to load the disc twice). Simple and effective, and works for me.

That's pretty good advice! Unfortunately, I've had a few discs that reset the playback speed when one trailer is finished and another begins, meaning you have to start the fast forward process all over again. What a bother.

I've been using the stop-stop-play method for a while now, with a great deal of success.

Can't find a trick for PS3. The STOP button is not good with that machine, you basically have to wait for the thing to spin the disc back to life if going that route. The square symbol button sometimes works but that and FFW and chapter advance many times give a not allowed message.

My Philips DVD player seems to do this automatically* which I still haven't gotten used to. I'll put the DVD in while I get a snack, and by the time I come back, it's 5 minutes into the film, and I have to skip back to the start.

* I have installed some unofficial firmware to make the USB menu easier to read, so perhaps that's where this 'feature' came from.

VLC Player does this by default. When you put in the DVD it skips right to either the menu or the start of the movie itself. I highly recommend the player anyway since it plays virtually all unencrypted media file and format. http://www.videolan.org/vlc/

I echo Greg - this is exactly why I like using the VLC player. And it's freeware! Another trick I use to skip the FBI warning is that from the DVD main menu, instead of hitting "Play", I go to scene selection and play scene two, then I back up and watch the movie from the beginning.

I often just put the DVD in the player 5-10 minutes before I want to watch the movie. The trailers play while the TV is off (or watching a TV program). By movie time, the DVD is sitting at the menu waiting for me.

Nothing seems to work on my DVD player and the trailers have been 20 minutes. I agree that honest people are treated very poorly by the industry and hackers don't have to put up with poor customer service. I'll vote with my feet and walk away.

I'm not walking away yet. When the Netflix DVD content that I purchased will not play within a reasonable time (1 minute), I cut the disc in half and send it back as defective. When they try to charge me for the defective discs, that's when I'll walk away.

John W. is an idiot and should be sued. I hope Netflix discovers him. He increases the cost of Netflix service for everyone. It's not Netflix that forces this content, it's the studio. Netflix has nothing to do with it. Wise up, dope.

Last night we sat down to TRY to watch "Inception", but as the third COMMERCIAL began (not preview), I was so annoyed I sent the disc back as unplayable. FFWD, NEXT button, Top Menu/Menu buttons all on lock-down. If studios all start doing this I will be really, really pissed. One of the commercials for a video game even warned of possible inappropriate material for children (nice). I admit I have not tried the STOP-STOP-PLAY trick, because until today I've been able to circumvent these things by using the aforementioned-but-locked-down buttons on the Inception disc. I would've written to Netflix to complain but all they have now on the site is the customer service phone number...no thanks. While I agree no one should damage a disc intentionally, I disagree that Netflix isn't at all responsible; they need to be screening for these types of discs and reject from studios discs with forced commercials.